


Obligation

by thefilthiestpiglet



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: HYDRA Trash Party, Identity Issues, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-19
Updated: 2016-03-20
Packaged: 2018-05-27 19:03:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6296101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefilthiestpiglet/pseuds/thefilthiestpiglet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fill for a <a href="http://hydratrashmeme.dreamwidth.org/1634.html?thread=3773282#cmt3773282">trashmeme prompt</a>, summarized as: Post-TWS, the Asset considers Steve the Best Handler Ever, and is totally in love.  "The Asset is required to offer himself sexually to his handlers, of course, and he offers himself with good cheer and considerable enthusiasm to this one, because this one is LITERALLY THE BEST. Steve always turns him down, though, and this makes the Asset sad. It's not that Steve necessarily objects to the idea of sex with him, the Asset is given to understand, but Steve's waiting for him to "recover." To turn [back?] into someone else. And that's (a) hurtful, and (b) not going to happen. " </p><p>Basically: consent issues and power imbalance creates the ultimate cock-block for the Asset.  What do?</p><p>Trash only in passing, and in the two pics that I'm putting in the notes section at the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It took 15 days before the Asset decided to turn himself in to Captain Rogers and the Avengers. In that time, he had watched enough videos and read enough books to ascertain that Captain Rogers was his original handler.

It only took Steve 1 day to completely confuse the Asset's expectations about handlers: he did everything backwards from all the other handlers that the Asset has had. 

The first thing he did backwards, was to insist that the Asset call him "Steve" instead of by title or command structure. He asked the Asset what he preferred to be called. He vaguely remembered that when Steve was his original handler, he was called Sergeant, but also listed off some other commonly used names -- Soldier, Soldat, Winter, Asset, Hound, Puppy, Fucktoy, Thing, Freak. Steve frowned and said "How about James? If you don't feel comfortable being Bucky just yet, let's go with that." James sounded like a person name, and not an assignation of the Asset's station. How was the Asset supposed to figure out what it meant to be a "James"? The Asset frowned, but a handler's decisions were to be obeyed.

The rest of the day had been equally backwards. Steve sent him to doctors who didn't hurt him. Instead of gags and restraints they wanted him to sit or stand wherever he felt comfortable, and to *talk*. For lunch he was ordered to sit at a table with everyone else on the Avengers team and eat the same food that they did. When his stomach made a mistake, he wasn't ordered to lick it off the ground, nor did he have his table privileges revoked and sent to the basement for tube feeding. Instead, Steve helped him clean up the mess and then *he* apologized for not checking the Asset's permitted diet ahead of time. 

In the afternoon, the training regimen that Steve assigned to the Asset was similarly backwards. Instead of first breaking his ankle, then ordering him to fight to the point of collapse, and finally strapping him to some wires for analysis and repair, the Asset was first strapped to some wires, and told to fight. They stopped him at the first sign of physical pain. It was very confusingly backwards -- as if they cared more about his body's performance than mission completion. 

Soon, it was the end of the day, and the Asset had discovered that as James, he hadn't been on his knees once, nor had he been restrained or in pain. There was a strange sensation along his spine. After some assessment, he determined that it was a relaxation of muscles. He was curious to see what would happen when he was alone with his handler. He's had handlers before who were one way in front of others, and another way when alone. 

After dinner, he followed Steve to his quarters to await his evening assignment. Some handlers preferred the Asset to behave a certain way in private (naked, or always smiling, or barking, or merely attentive unless spoken to,) and while it's standard for the Asset to be in close proximity to his handler to easily satisfy their needs in the evening, different handlers tended to restrict the Asset to different parts of the quarters (a corner, the floor by the bed, a rug in the basement, etc.) A part of the Asset was intrigued by how Steve could possibly do this part backwards. Maybe the Asset would be ordered to stay off the floor altogether, and to keep to the couch or the bed? 

It turned out that the Asset was given full access to all of Steve's apartment, and was even assigned quarters of his own that were equal in amenities and size to Steve's own room. It was not filled with any personal items, but Steve also gave the Asset some clothing and a laptop and phone and a charge account. For personal use. The Asset was given explicit instructions to populate his room as he saw fit with personal items. Surprisingly, the only room where access was restricted was Steve's bedroom. For other handlers, that was usually the default room for keeping the Asset.

The Asset waited for Steve to give the standard orders for sexual relief, but as was the rest of this topsy-turvy day, Steve just ordered the Asset to get a good night's sleep in his own room, and to provide feedback if sleeping on the bed felt weird.

That night, as the Asset laid on a bed with no pain, no restraints, and no semen in any of his orifices, he saw that his charge card had the name "James B Barnes" written on it, and decided that maybe being designated a "James" was a step up from being an Asset.

But he's been assigned person aliases before. And there had been handlers who gave the Asset many things in the first few weeks, only to take them away later. So the Asset would wait and observe. Follow orders and see just how good a handler Steve was.

\-----

On the 61st day, the Asset decided that it was mostly safe to be James. None of the treatment from the first day had changed. He discovered that he enjoyed working with the Avengers on missions. Unlike HYDRA, the non-mission time was long and not filled with tests and mind wipes.

His non-mission assignment from Steve was to write down everything that he could remember. Remembering was easy -- he could remember every bullet he shot, every time he'd been cut open, and every handler's preferences. He could even remember what things brought relief (completing a mission, a reward from a handler), and what things brought pain (most other things), so he wrote those down, too. 

The memory recording process made James realize that his time with Steve as his handler was mostly filled with relief. He began to seek out activities that made him feel more relief. Morning Tai Chi with old Chinese women in the park. Afternoon Russian tea time with the Widow. Target practice with Barton. Logistical support for Ms. Potts. 3am lab time with Stark. Relief.

And through it all, Steve had been the best handler that James could ask for: giving enough instructions to make James feel supported, arranging painless doctor's visits and missions, accepting all of James' mistakes without doling out punishment. He encouraged James' seeking of relief, although he called it "recovery."

On the night of the 61st day was when James discovered that he had not been a proper Asset.

It was 2am, and he'd just gotten back to the apartment from Stark's lab, where Stark had given him snacks and showed him many interesting diagrams. He heard a distressed noise from Steve's room. He rushed to Steve's door.

His handler was in distress. His handler needed his help. But Steve's room was also closed. He knelt by the door and listened as best as his heightened senses would allow. Sounds of irregular breathing, tossing and turning. Steve was having a nightmare and kept shouting, "Bucky, no!" 

James stood guard outside Steve's room the rest of the night, long after Steve's moaning subsided. For the first time, James felt pain: his handler, the best handler he'd ever had, was having nightmares, and James was stuck on the other side of the door.

Over the next few days, James noted other ways that he'd been underperforming as an Asset, as marked in tiny frowns that marred Steve's perfect face.

Every time he turned in a new notebook of memories to Steve, he would flip through and frown, before putting on a smile and telling James that he'd done a good job.

On missions and training sessions, James would follow Steve's orders perfectly, but even so, sometimes Steve would say, "You didn't have to do that, James." 

When preparing meals, Steve would ask James "and what do you think?" James always deferred to Steve, but Steve would still frown despite the deference. Similarly, Steve would frown whenever James stood up from the couch to give Steve the full range of seating options. 

Conclusions: (a) Steve was dissatisfied with some aspect of James' performance. (b) Steve was too kind of a handler to directly correct James. (c) To be an asset worthy of Steve, James would have to figure it out for himself.

After 1 full week of observation and self-assessment of his major duties as an Asset, the answer was clear: James had not been providing Steve with proper sexual relief.

James felt a prickle of excitement. This was the opposite of the tension and pain that typically came with serving this part of his Asset duties. Steve probably never asked because he did everything backwards. All this time, James had been waiting for Steve to issue the order, but Steve was a handler who appreciated initiative. Steve was waiting for James to make the first move.

And since Steve did everything backwards, the sex itself would probably be pleasurable not only to the handler, but also to James. As further evidence of what a topsy-turvy life he now lived as an Asset to Steve, James felt his cock reacting in *anticipation.*

* * * * *

Steve's head was full of the day's meetings when he got back home, so it took him a moment to notice that something was different.

Bucky was sitting on the couch, but the TV wasn't on. He put down the book he was reading the moment Steve came in, and smiled at Steve shyly. Bucky was. Naked. "Hi there, Steve." Steve stopped short.

"Bu...James, what are you doing?" Steve tried not to blush, and quickly turned to look in a safer direction -- the kitchen counters. But it was already too late -- he'd already seen Bucky's perfectly toned muscles, and his memory was eagerly replaying everything in high definition. Bucky's shoulders are broader now than before, but it's the same thin line of hair down Bucky's abdomen and down to his cock, twitching with an excitement that he still remembered from that summer of 1939...

From his peripheral vision Steve saw Bucky rounding up on him, walking with that familiar easy saunter until he got unbearably close. He could feel Bucky's breath on the back of his neck. "Steve..." He reached out one hand to wrap around Steve's shoulder, and another reach around to gently cup Steve's crotch. "... I'm ready for you." Bucky murmured into Steve's ear as he pressed his hard cock against Steve. Steve blushed harder as he felt himself hard and straining under Bucky's grasp, and couldn't help moaning a bit as he leaned into Bucky's arms. God he's missed this with Bucky. Steve turned around so that his lips could reach Bucky's eager mouth... and found himself staring into alert, assessing eyes.

Wait. This is wrong. He'd almost.... Steve stepped back in horror, leaving Bucky standing there, one arm still up. Bucky was still flushed from the embrace, but he quickly composed himself and dropped his hands to his sides. "What did I do wrong, Steve?" He looked pointedly at Steve's still-hard cock. "I thought you wanted this."

Steve took a few slow breaths and mentally kicked himself for forgetting the current stage in Bucky's recovery. "James. I... it's just a physical reaction." He gestured weakly before pulling out a chair and sitting down at the kitchen table. "I... I shouldn't."

Bucky quirked an eyebrow and sat down in the chair opposite. "I don't understand, Steve." Bucky always said Steve's name with a small pause, as if he were saying Sir. Usually Steve found it annoying, but here it was another welcome reminder that Bucky wasn't quite himself yet.

"Can you ... um... explain what you were thinking tonight?" Steve racked his brain for what could possibly be special about the day -- it wasn't either of their birthdays, so maybe it was some anniversary that Bucky'd remembered, like the first time they roomed together, or the first night they fumbled in each other's pants?

"You've been unhappy with my performance and lack of initiative, and I thought you'd like it if I offered sexual relief instead of waiting for your command."

The rest of Steve's erection was gone, now. "Waiting for my *command*?" As if Steve needed more proof that Bucky's not ready for sex with anyone, much less Steve. Articles about command rape kept scrolling through Steve's head. 

Bucky shrugged. "Well, most handlers would have just given me orders on the first night, so when you didn't, I thought you just weren't interested." He gave Steve's crotch another forlorn look. "But then I figured maybe it was because you were such a good and patient handler in other ways, you were waiting for *me* to make the first move." 

Waiting on Bucky, yes. But not in that way. Waiting for Bucky's memories to come back a bit more. Waiting for the Asset mentality to be less dominant. Later, Steve reminded himself. In his current state, Bucky was still stuck thinking of Steve as his handler. 

"What did I do wrong, Steve? It was going good for you. Your body indicated that it was pleasurable for you..." Bucky looked at Steve with renewed determination. "I want to make it good for you, Steve. Did you want something more traditional?" Bucky got on his knees and his face instantly changed to one of utter submission. "Please, Steve?" He was looking at Steve, eyes timid but full of lust. "Let me suck your cock."

Steve gulped. Everything about this went straight to his dick, but that's not right. He was here to help Bucky's recovery, dammit. Steve closed his eyes and reminded himself that Bucky's faking this -- Bucky didn't remember what they had before the war. And if Bucky couldn't decide what to have for dinner, there's no way Bucky could decide to have sex. Steve firmly told his cock to mind its own business, and put on his best Handler voice. "James. Sit back up in the chair."

A part of him wished that Bucky didn't comply so readily. But... "James, sex, for me, is more than just a physical reaction. I ... I can take care of the physical stuff myself just fine." After all, he'd been doing just that for the last 3 years.

"But what if I *want* to be the one to take care of it for you?" Bucky looked rather insistent. Steve sighed internally -- his therapist warned him about the faun response and eagerness to please.

"That's not the point. The point is that ... well, you'd do anything I order you to, right?"

"Of course, you're my handler. But you've been so good about..."

"And so if I ordered you to, say, have sex with Sam, or the whole team, you would."

"Of course, it's part of my operation parameters. But with you it's different because..." Bucky blushed. 

"Because I'm your handler?" Steve felt a familiar knot in his stomach.

"Yes. You're the best handler."

Steve marveled at the amount of blind loyalty HYDRA had managed to train into Bucky. 

"This is why I can't do this to you, James. Ordering you to serve as my ... 'sexual relief' would just be taking advantage of you. You need to feel like you can say no to me." 

"But you're the best handler and I don't *want* to say no to you..." Bucky is frowning.

Steve scratched his head. Even though it's been two months, Bucky still needed constant reassurances that he's not in trouble. Maybe he needed to postpone this conversation for when Bucky's more himself. "Later, James. Let's pick this up again when you're a bit more recovered, when you've got more of your memories back." Steve took a deep breath. "Now, how about putting on some pants and we go get some dinner?"

Bucky calmly got up from the floor. "Sure thing, Steve."

* * * * *

The clock next to James' bed said 02:14.

James replayed Steve's words to him yet another time. Steve always said things like "recovered" and "getting your memories back." James knew what Steve really meant though: it was code for "Steve missed Bucky."

James grimaced. Bucky. Ugh. Steve was always saying things like "Do you remember back when..." or look at James expectantly when he made or bought certain types of foods. James would always shrug and eat the food and tell Steve that it tasted good. That generally caused Steve to return to a normal state. Remembering Bucky Barnes made Steve unstable, and a poor handler. Steve would not have been captured by Commander Rumlow if he hadn't remembered Bucky Barnes. Remembering Bucky Barnes made Steve make sub-par food with no flavors. Remembering Bucky Barnes caused Steve to have nightmares.

For some reason, Steve *wanted* to remember Bucky Barnes. More importantly, Steve would say things like "when you're better" to indicate that he wanted James to be like Bucky. Steve considered Bucky to be superior to James, even though James was better at protecting Steve during missions, and did not hurt Steve the way that Bucky did. 

But... if being Bucky Barnes meant that Steve would look at him the way he did today -- like he was the best thing that happened to Steve -- maybe James could pretend to be Bucky. Even if it's just for a few hours.

After all, Steve was the best thing that happened to James. And until today, until the moment James felt Steve's cock twitch and nipples harden under his hands, James didn't know how much he *wanted* Steve. Steve relaxed and trembling from arousal. Steve reaching orgasm on him, in him, with him. It would be more than relief, it would be ... pleasure. Handlers of the past wanted many things from James' body -- pain, obedience, lust, but never pleasure. But today, Steve showed James how intoxicating it was to have his own pleasure stir up a complementary reaction in his handler. The way his cock hardened and heart rate elevated from the feeling of Steve's cock and vice versa... James wanted more of that.

Steve clearly had the same need. Just with Bucky, not James.

James sighed. It's not that he didn't remember things that Bucky said or did with Steve. Most of it just seemed so ... irrelevant. James understood the mission-relevant parts, like the relief Bucky felt when he saved Steve from harm, or where Bucky had actual missions against HYDRA. But the rest of it had neither pain nor relief, just endless undirected actions. There were even some memories of sex with Steve, but there wasn't the same *want* in those memories as he felt now. Bucky took reciprocal pleasure for granted -- after all, Bucky hadn't had the years of pain that James experienced.

A chilling thought came to James: it won't just be a few hours of pretending. Steve's too smart and would see through that. And no matter what arousal Steve's body felt, Steve would hold back and *wait*, just like today. Steve had made it clear: as a handler, he saw sex with his asset as an undue burden on the asset, and Steve was too kind a handler to make those demands. Steve didn't just want reciprocal pleasure, he wanted "recovery." He wanted a Bucky who "has his memories back." 

James hesitated. This meant that if he pretended to be Bucky Barnes, it would have to be a permanent thing. Bucky felt about things differently from James. Bucky would not do tai chi in the park in the mornings. Would Bucky have tea with Natasha and argue about Khruschev's taste in literature? Probably not. Instead Bucky would drink coffee and argue with Steve about baseball.

Was becoming Bucky worth it? To be allowed into Steve's bedroom and properly protect Steve, to erase Steve's small frowns. To give and receive pleasure with the best handler ever. To see Steve orgasm as he shouts Bucky's name.

The clock by the bed now said 05:20. James got off the bed. Maybe a walk around the Tower would help. 

 

* * * * * 

Natasha hit the button to Steve's floor and gave herself 3 seconds to compose herself. Her emotions were too complicated right now. Anger, exasperation, worry, fatigue... she needed to pick just one to show Steve. 

Anger. Steve responded well to anger. Plus it'd make the conversation shorter, and afterwards she'll reward herself by going costume shopping with Pepper. On cue, the elevator door slid open. Before Steve could even look up from the couch where he's sketching, she started the conversation with a sharp, "Steve, what the fuck happened? You need to stop being a jerk to James."

Steve put down his sketchbook instantly. "What did I do? What's wrong with Bucky?"

Briefly Natasha wondered if James knew that Steve still called him Bucky when he's not around. She let that thought sharpen her anger. "JAMES is currently at my place, twitching over a pile of books about Bucky Barnes." Leave it to James to find the one non-digital library in the entire tower. Probably courtesy of Stark Sr. 

"Books about Bucky? But why would he need that?" 

Natasha slipped in a bit of exasperation to her voice. "He told me you preferred Bucky. And for you, he's willing to erase what he's become just so that he *can* be." There's a knot in her stomach. James had come so far the last few months. And to throw that all away...

"But .... I didn't..." Steve was all confusion. Natasha calmed her nerves and waited for Steve's brain to catch up. "Oh wait. THAT."

Steve was ... blushing? Curious. But at least they were getting somewhere. Natasha leaned against the counter, picked up an apple, and bit into it. A good way to defuse confrontations and ease into awkward conversations. "Well?"

Steve blushed harder. "So last night I got home and Bucky, he was naked. And he... he made a show of wanting it. Anyways, I reacted before I realized that he was still thinking of me as his handler." Judging by Steve's uncomfortable stance, Natasha could imagine what Steve meant by "reacted." She carefully quirked an eyebrow.

"It's okay, though. I put a stop to it once I realized that he was faking it for my benefit." Steve scratched his head. "And I called him James the whole time, so that shouldn't have caused any identity confusion." Steve picked up his phone. "Maybe I should confirm with Dr. Weiss..."

Nat sighed and stopped him. "Steve, Dr. Weiss can't help with the problem here -- she lacks the personal experience. But I can." Steve cocked his head as Natasha plowed forward. "First, there's two things that you need to understand." She relaxed her face a little, letting all the other feelings show briefly. Steve must have understood what he saw there, because he nodded and sat down on the couch to listen.

Natasha took a slow breath to brace herself. She's not good at coming at the truth head on, but it's what Steve needed. "One, that James isn't Bucky, and two, that James isn't faking it."

"But I *always* call him James. And the consent issues at this stage..." Steve took it just as poorly as she'd expected, but at least the cards are on the table now.

Natasha sighed. "Steve, I've seen the way you look at James. The way you keep expecting him to remember, to suddenly start sliding into the right accent and making the right jokes. You keep calling him James and expecting him to be Bucky. And James isn't stupid. You don't survive what he has without being able to read people's real desires."

Steve bit his lip. "Well, Buc... he's recovering from being the Asset. He's getting more memories back every day. The other day he looked up Coney Island on a map, and when he laughed at Thor's joke he sounded just like..."

"That's exactly it, Steve -- you keep thinking of James as some temporary form in-between the Asset and Bucky." She's too much of a professional to throw up her hands in exasperation, but she bit extra hard into her apple. "To me, he just sounds like James when he laughs." Steve opened his mouth, then closed it again. 

Natasha pushed forward. "James is his own person. He's what's survived after what HYDRA's done to him." She felt the scars and empty spaces in her own self as she said this. "As James recovers, he's going to become more James, not more Bucky." 

Steve frowned and bit his lip. Natasha could tell this was going to take some processing for him, but at least he's taking the idea seriously. "But *if* he's James, if he's going to keep treating me like his handler, letting me make all the decisions, from food to missions to which doctors he sees..."

"... How can he possibly want sex for himself?" Natasha chose to go for rueful instead of wistful. "Because consent doesn't work the same way with people like us."

Steve's jaw dropped again. "Nat, I'm sorry, I didn't mean..." Natasha allowed herself a little internal smile. Vulnerability hurt, being truthful hurt, but it works.

"Sex for us is... different. Me and the Red Room, him and HYDRA ... when you've been taken apart and pieced back together that many times, you don't really see bodies and consent in the same way. For me, it's a tool, a weapon I can use to take down an enemy. For James, who was turned into a weapon himself -- it's just an additional function or feature that he can offer. That he *wants* to offer to you."

Natasha could tell that Steve was having a hard time reconciling this. Small wonder: Steve's life was about about choosing. Choosing to fight against his sicknesses. Choosing to be an experimental subject. Choosing to pilot a plane into the Arctic. Choosing to take down all of SHIELD. The only thing he didn't choose was his defrosting, and look how well he coped with that. Steve's firm belief in everyone's right to choose is what makes him a good man and Captain America, but it's making Natasha's message harder to process.

Already Steve was making protesting noises. "But doesn't that make it even *more* important that I let him reclaim that? He feels obligated to have sex with his handlers. That is duress, not desire. I can't do that to him. He needs to be able to choose for himself..."

"He *is*, Steve. As best as he can. If given the chance, he'd just choose to have sex with you. Except that right now you're making him choose between the sex with you and staying as 'James'. And that's the shittiest choice of all. Don't you realize..." Natasha cut herself off before she truly lost control. Just because she knew how hard it was to find something of oneself amidst a maze of names and identities and missions doesn't mean she should take it out on Steve. She needed to stop.

She sighed and got up to leave, tossing the apple core in the trash. "I have a date with Pepper." She needed to get out before all her insides exploded. "Just... go talk to him, okay? Talk to him as James, the man who chose to come to you when he could have gone anywhere after Insight. He's still at my place if you want to go right now."

Natasha managed an encouraging nod at Steve before the elevator door closed. Then she slumped down and shivered for a few seconds to let all those extra emotions. What James was doing .. she couldn't picture loving someone enough to give up everything that she'd made of herself these last few years. Hopefully she'd gotten to Steve enough for him to stop it. 

* * * * * 

Steve decided to do the dishes and tidy up the apartment before going out to find Bucky... er, James. Natasha was right on that point, at least -- it's unfair for him to treat James as just an unfortunate byproduct on the way to a fully recovered Bucky. After all, Steve himself wasn't the same person he was back in 1944. Still, just because his brain told him the rational behavior for the situation didn't make it easy for him to accept that the Bucky of his memories is just ... gone. To look at all the things that James did and *not* see it as flickers of *his* Bucky.

But James was *his*, too. It's not Steve and Bucky, best friends on the playground and the battlefield. It's Steve and James, handler and asset. And he owed it to James to at the very least, be a good handler. Steve put away the last dish. Well, duty called.

Steve stepped into Natasha's living room just as James came out of her shower. For the second time in less than 24 hours, Steve stopped short. James was half-naked, but more than that .. 

"You... you cut your hair." It was Bucky's haircut from the war. It looked odd juxtaposed against James' scarred body.

"I figured it was time. Makes me feel more like my old self." Steve winced at the careful way that James replicated Bucky's accent and nonchalance from the 40s. Natasha was right. This felt all wrong. James' demeanor was quieter, outwardly more submissive and restrained. James wouldn't saunter over and drape himself over the couch in a thin towel like this. And James' eyes had a steely quality to them that Steve didn't realize he missed until he got pegged with one of Bucky's classic lazy come-hither glances. "You were right last night, Steve -- I need to get better before we can get back to the way we were." 

And he was the one who pushed James to this.

Steve walked over and sat down gingerly on the other end of the couch. "James... you don't have to pretend to be Bucky for me."

A bit of James' nervous look slipped into his expression before he turned back to the half-lidded charm. "What do you mean, Stevie? I just recovered a big chunk of my memories. You want me to prove it to you? Ask me anything about that time. Remember when the O'Neill brothers..."

Steve's heart hitched. An hour ago he would have been ecstatic to hear this, but now, seeing this facsimilie of Bucky reciting an old story just made him feel sick. "James... I'm sorry about what I said last night." James stopped. "Nat came to talk to me. About how I should stop expecting you to be Bucky." 

There was a momentary silence as Steve stared awkwardly ahead and felt James' eyes bore into his head.

"You... you mean it this time." As James' voice lost the heavy Brooklyn, Steve let go of a breath he didn't realize he was holding.

Steve reached over and took James' hands. "I'm sorry, James. I kept looking for Bucky that I haven't been a good handler to *you*." Steve looked into James' cautious but assessing eyes, and thought about all the little ways that James expressed his love for Steve. The way James trusted Steve to make the right decisions at mealtimes. The way James let Steve read his memories in a literal open book. The way James put himself in harm's way to make sure Steve stayed safe on missions. Steve found himself smiling. This new relationship is just as deep as the old one, he just hadn't let himself see it for what it was. "Thank you, James, for always being here for me. You're the best asset a handler could have."

James sat up straight, then, his eyes soft and ... happy. Steve hadn't seen James this pleased before, and seeing that made Steve feel surprisingly happy, too. For the past two months, being a handler felt like a burden, something that he had to push through to get Bucky to a healthy mental state. But to care for James, to love him and trust him and help him -- that is a pleasure. A duty, certainly, but something he *wanted* to do. Maybe that's what Natasha was trying to say with her second point.

Carefully, Steve reached over and pulled James into a gentle embrace, and chuckled as James nuzzled eagerly into his shoulder. To his surprise, it felt ... right. "About last night -- it'll take time for us to figure out what you and I actually want from each other. But in the meantime, don't stop being James, all right?" James responded by tentatively nibbling on Steve's neck, which sent a tingle straight down Steve's spine. 

Maybe obligation and desire didn't have to be mutually exclusive after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Click next for more! :D!!
> 
> I like drawing filth more than I like writing it, so here's two types of handlers that the Asset had in the past --
> 
> The "I guess I have an asset now, let’s just put him here behind some nominal baby/dog gates and go back to doing my thing" variety:  
>   
> In other words, as long as the asset recognized the handler's power over him, nothing super bad happened.
> 
> And the "Wait you mean I can do whatever I want and he’s going to obey me? Trashy porn plans activate!" variety:  
>   
> In this handler's case, he liked chaining the Asset to the bed -- with just enough give that the Asset could wake him up with a proper blowjob in the morning. One time, the handler's place got attacked in the middle of the night and the Asset had to break the chain to properly defend the handler. Afterward, the handler got to try out the new cane that he'd bought.


	2. hotttttt fic present!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> holy shit the original prompter left me the hottest fic ever of Steve and the Asset having sexytimes! It's here: <http://archiveofourown.org/works/6298378>
> 
> And I couldn't help drawing something for the first bit... :D!!!
> 
> THANK YOU BEAUTIFUL ANON!!!

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh man, why is sex so much easier to draw than to write? :X

**Author's Note:**

> I post and reblog filthy fanart on [tumblr](http://thefilthiestpiglet.tumblr.com).


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